


A Whole Lot of Something

by allthegayotps



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Charlie Lives, Chuck is God
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-26
Updated: 2016-05-26
Packaged: 2018-07-10 07:46:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6974035
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/allthegayotps/pseuds/allthegayotps
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Really, this is a whole lot of something and just a little bit of nothing. How Season 12 <em>should</em> go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Last of My Kind

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Recycling the torture chair. Cas takes care of drunk Sam. Mary meets Cas.

Sam saw the muscles in her arm twitch, watched them move to pull back on the trigger the way he could feel without actually having a gun in his hand. He could remember the feeling as he dropped out from in front of the chamber. Dean may have died, but he wasn't about to follow in his brother's footsteps within the same hour. The bullet flew across the room and Sam threw himself at the Englander that had invaded his home and blasted Cas away. He had her hands pulled apart, pressed against the bare wall separating the war room/library area and was almost breathing in her face when he spit out the words roiling in his brain.

"Listen, lady. I lost my brother today to save the whole damned Universe." His fingers pulled tighter around her wrists, twisting slightly on the right to force her to release the gun. "Including you." You was accompanied by the clatter of the gun on the war room floor. "I would appreciate it if I could at least have a drink to celebrate the fact that I'm now the very last in a long line of Winchesters roaming the Earth before someone threatens to take us off the map for good."

Her jaw was set and Sam had to moved to the side before he became too acquainted with her knees. "As I've told you, the London Chapter has been keeping it's eyes on you two and I am to bring you in immediately." Sam laughed sarcastically and quickly locked both wrists behind her back in one hand, pushing her face into the concrete lightly before he began walking her down the hallway to the torture chamber.

"I don't think you're getting this." The lady was struggling, pulling at his hands and pushing at the ground to keep from following the steady pressure of his guidance. "I'm not going anywhere right now and you're going to have to chill out and talk to me." He was pushing the door open with his foot, guiding her in when she grew limp, dropping to the ground in an attempt to free herself from his grasp. No dice, though. "I've thought of it all. You're not getting out of this unless we can be reasonable."

"I was being reasonable!" She sat up with a fire burning in her eyes, teeth gritted though she was speaking. "You are a threat to the Earth as we know it Samuel Winchester and you must be detained and dealt with!" Sam rolled his eyes, dragging her through the stacks of stock to the chair they hadn't put to use since they'd cured demon Dean. He was latching the first cuff when he decided to open his mouth again.

"Let's resume this conversation when I've gotten a few drinks in, shall we?" The grimace tasted like acid, but he kept it until he'd fully detained her and checked every space on her body for something to pick the lock - which resulted in his hands being filled with everything from bobby pins to full picking sets. He carried all of these things out and lay them on the counter in the kitchen, remembering the sweets that had been laid out there when Sully had come and asked for their help before. 

 _Their help_. It was just Sam now. Was this when he hung up his gloves and tried to make his peace with the world he lived in? Give Dean the funeral he wanted and go onto live the life he's dreamed of since forever with one major downfall? How was he supposed to actually enjoy life without Dean to make horrible pop culture jokes and innuendos at the worst possible moments? Sam sighed and went in search of their most potent liquor, coming up with the bottle Chuck had handled before. 

Sam's hands were literally in the shadow of God's... and they were bigger. He snickered to himself as he counted the fingers of whiskey he was pouring. At five, he decided to just drink from the bottle. This was how Castiel found him. Staring into the empty space across from him at the table in the war room, tears dripping from his face and a bottle of scotch almost empty under his chin. So blindly drunk that he'd called Castiel Dean at least five times before mentioning the lady in the torture chamber ready to bring him with her to England. 

Honestly, Castiel couldn't have cared less. He was watching Sam spiral the way Dean would have if the situation ere any different and it was killing him that he wasn't there to deescalate the situation. He was hauling Sam down the hall, intending to lay him in bed when the Hunter suddenly sobered enough to think straight for just a moment. That moment was all he needed to rip the wounds in Castiel's heart anew as he swung open Sam's bedroom door. 

"He's all I had left." Sam was broken, his words belying the huge loss he'd suffered just in the past few hours - not to mention the year, or decade. "He's my brother." Cas slowly laid him out on the bed, taking the time to pull off his boots and pull the blanket around his waist before leaving Sam to stew in his inebriated mind until the next morning. He only made it as far as the other side of the door before the full weight of the day had hit him and he slid down the wooden barrier. 

"I understand." Cas whispered the words so lightly he was sure even the wind hadn't heard the syllables clearly, but he felt them through the marrow in his vessel's bones. He understood that Sam was hurting because _he_ was hurting. He'd lost Dean, his whole reason to keep moving forward in his existence. The reason he'd rebelled against Heaven, the reason he'd freed the Leviathan from Purgatory, the reason he'd stolen the Angel tablet, the reason he'd said yes to Lucifer. It had all been for Dean. To make sure Dean was _safe_.

Now, there was a woman in the torture chair, Dean was dead, Sam as losing it, and he could feel his Grace slowly draining. He stood, deciding to check in their house guest before she decided to do the same for them. He was shuffling down the hall when the front door creaked ominously, triggering his first response - _fight_. The low thud of boots didn't register before he'd turned the corner with his blade drawn, waning Grace crackling underneath his borrowed skin with purpose. Two pairs of the same green eyes were focused on him when he did so, one eager and the other confused. 

"Dean." Cas was watching as the darkness slowly crept into the edges of his vision, blocking out more and more of the room around the two descending the Bunker's stairs. "Mary." Her mouth grew into an exuberant smile, but Cas didn't mind it too much. Mostly because he was beginning to lose the last of his sight to the utter exhaustion slowly slipping across his body.

"Cas?" And then he was taken away into the oblivion of deep sleep, her arms carrying him away with the promise he'd feel better afterward. And maybe she was right in that promise.


	2. Zombie Mom

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mary came back from the dead. Dean tells his life story. Cas is intoxicated. Why is there someone in the torture chamber?

Surely, there had to be a town somewhere. He wasn't getting service and there was literally nothing but woods for hours outside the park where Chuck and Amara had left him. Several times, he prayed that one of them step on the nearest LEGO block for leaving him stranded in the middle of goddamned nowhere.

"C'mon," he was stepping out from the tree line, holding the phone up in hopes that he might finally find a bar of service. "Where the Hell am I?" He was staring up at the stars hopelessly when a woman's voice rang out through the night ominously. I mean, there were only a few women who truly were that calm when calling for help if they weren't ghosts or other creatures of the night.

"Help me." He ran through the thinning trees toward the sound of her voice, catching her form before the knowledge and his reaction had clicked together in his mind. Running toward the voice had been his automatic response to the sound of his mother's voice. The voice he could only hear in dreams or djinn-induced visions of what his life would be with her still in it. She was confused, eyes glancing around him before they truly settled. The small gasp that pulled it's way through her teeth alerted him to the reality of his situation, the reality of seeing his mom standing in front of him in the same outfit she'd been wearing the day they'd buried her.

"Mom?" He watched her face contort in confusion and fear, glancing around as if expecting him to either jump up and yell "surprise" or to be looking at another woman in the utterly deserted cemetery. And it made complete sense. Mary Winchester had been dead for over thirty years and her sons had been too small to really know her full name at the time, much less full grown and carrying a 45 - that he hadn't pulled out, thank every god and goddess ever - in the waistband of his jeans.

"Who are you?" She turns her eyes back to look at him, her confusion painting her fair features to mask the terror underneath. But, of course. She had been burning one the ceiling and now... She was in the middle of a cemetery with a granite rock with her name carved into it. "Please, help me. My baby... I need to find my baby."

"Okay." Dean slowly lifted his hands, revealing that he was only holding a phone before he decided to step closer. "It's okay, do you know your name? The date?"

"Of course I know my name." She gave him a look of disdain, almost insulted by his questions before answering them. "It's the second and my name is Mary." Dean was still stepping closer, rattled by just how little about her had changed from the memories of being a four-year-old and so completely adoring of his mother. 

"The, uh," he shook his head and looked away for a moment, hoping not to scare her before he could assess the situation. "The second of what?"

Mary scoffed and placed her hands on her hips, the purse of her lips blatantly obvious though he wasn't looking at her. "November, 1983. Do you think I'm concussed or something? I'm just terrified and I need to _find my baby_."

"Oh, yeah." Dean rubbed a hand over his tanned face, wetting his lips before deciding to check for service on his phone. Fulls bars, as expected. "This day just keeps on a-comin'."

"Excuse me?" Mary crossed her arms, throwing a hip out the way she would before Dean had gotten a good scolding when he was younger.

"I'm gonna tell you the date in a minute, then you're gonna argue with me because you've been dead thirty-three years." He threw his chin back, staring up to the sky in wordless protest to Amara's parting gift - no matter how much he loved his mother, this shtick was getting old with her. "Then, you're gonna cry because you missed Sam and I's baby years, I'm gonna have to find out what stupid thing the only two guys I've got left have done so far and dry your tears at the same time." Dean buried a hand in his short hair, wishing he could pull it all out for just an instant before a hand fell onto his elbow.

Again, he acted without thought. He'd been in fighting mode for hours, days even, and wasn't ready for a gentle touch instead of an attack. So, he had her hand pulled to touch the middle of her back before he was truly aware that this was his mother releasing startled gasps and struggling feebly against his grasp. She only had to do so for half a second, but it was half a second too long for Mary Winchester's temper. She had a hell of a right cuff if his cheek had anything to say within the next five minutes.

"Okay, kid, listen- "

"I'm older than you." Dean was almost sorry for interrupting, but watched the fury boil as she surged on in spite of him.

"- If what you're saying is true, I'm allowed to be freaking out right now." She hooked a finger up, pointing to her chest before her lips could let pass another sound. "If I... I've been dead and you two grew up without me." Mary looked to be on the verge of letting loose the tears Dean had known would come, eyes traveling up and down, up and down his body rapidly. Like she would find evidence he was lying there. "I have a right to be upset." Her voice was thick, betraying the need for tears as she turned away with slowly shaking shoulders. 

And Bingo! Dean felt like an asshat for the second time in a day because he couldn't make Cas feel better and he made his zombie mother cry not ten minutes after meeting her. Good job being a good human being as well as a good Hunter, Winchester. Oh, and you'll have to explain that to her before you waltz her into the Bunker where there's an angel possibly camping out in one of the guest beds. She'll be thrilled. He sighed and stepped to his right, facing Mary's back head-on though it didn't do much to make up for the eye contact they needed for a true conversation.

"I-It's been a long day and there's so much..." Dean didn't know how to sum it up in one sentence. You don't remember, but I tried to save you; the world was ending and I'm really sick of trying to fix things I didn't break; I need you to be my mother more than anything right now. "So much has happened that I don't know how to explain..." I've died so many times; I'm lost in this lifestyle; I've lost so many people. "But, I need you." He watched her head turn slightly, hair creating a curtain between her eyes and his in the relative darkness. "I need you to hum "Hey Jude" off-key and tell me not to mock my brother, Mom."

"Oh, baby." Mary was pulling him to her chest tightly, running her fingernails lightly against his scalp with the wetness of reality pressed against his forehead from her stained cheeks. "Of course, of course." She pressed a light kiss to his temple, letting out a shaky breath while soothing his scalp. "I will always be your mother, no matter how much older than me you are." He could feel his cheeks heating in response to the words, groaning internally at the chick-flick moment he was partaking in by letting her pull him close the way she was.

"Okay, okay." He pulled his head from her grasp, setting his hands on her shoulders lightly in place of bending in the awkward shape that Sam must fall into when hugging him. He decided he'd apologize for his getting all of the height genes in the family. "We have to find a way to get to Lebanon."

"Lebanon? What's in Lebanon?" Mary was wiping tears from her face as Dean pulled out his phone, quickly dialing Sam.

"Home." He breathed out a sigh of relief as he thought of memory foam mattresses and a coffee pot that always worked, but watched Mary's eyebrows crinkle in confusion. "The first real one since you, at least." 

"What?" Again, she looked more confused by his answers than she had when first asking him a question. Sam's voicemail picked up his call after about five rings.

 _...is not available at this time. If you would like to leave a message, wait for the tone. To page this number, press two now. If not, please hang up and try your call again. **Beep.**_ "Hey, it's me and I've got some news. Call me back as soon as you get this." He fished through the contents of his pockets, pulling out a full credit line and a few crumpled twenties from a night of hustling a few weeks back. 

"Why aren't you freaking out?" Mary's eyes were full of concern, probably hoping that he'd explain that he always saw visions of her instead of the obvious answer.

"In my experience, it takes a lot to kill a Winchester." Dean shoved the cards and money back into his pocket, heading off in the direction he knew led to I-70. She wasn't wearing shoes and people would be concerned for her, more likely to pick the both of them up as the hitchhiked their way to Lebanon.

"Are you..." Mary paused her words, feet moving just a bit quicker to keep up with his pace steadily. "You and Sam are..."

"Dad rose us in the business of revenge." He supplied the knowledge without letting her pull the words out like teeth, eyes trained in front of him so he wouldn't see the devastation of knowing how they were raised against her wishes. "Yellow-Eyes killed you, Dad hunted Yellow-Eyes until he died, Sam and I killed him dead." Dean made a big circle with one of his fingers, a sarcastic smile lighting the mood just a little bit. "And so, the circle of death was closed."

"That's-" 

"The last thing you wanted, I know." For the second time, Dean was aware that he should have kept his mouth shut. 

"What else do you know?" She sounded curious, but he waved a hand slightly, dismissing the idea of sharing the story of his life.

"It's a long story."

"Then, I'm glad we have all night for you to tell me." Dean let his eyebrows rise, turning to assess how seriously she meant those words and - to his surprise - she meant them. So, he let himself start on her last night and remember every detail of his life; every one of his father's drinks and every inch of clothing they received from schools when they'd grown too tall for theirs because Dad had left a few days ago and there was no way they could buy more on their own.

He recounted every night he tucked Sam into the back seat of the Impala to the very last moment he'd seen Sam in the hours of walking between various rides. They were less than a mile away from the Bunker when Mary finally complained about something instead of nodding, gasping, crying, or glaring toward her son angrily. "So, you didn't hug Castiel?"

"What?" He stopped her with a hand on her shoulder, mimicking the confusion she'd been unable to escape just five hours before.

"You hugged your brother, but not Castiel. Why?" She was blinking up at him, watching his mouth open and close slowly in response to her question. "Does he not mean as much to you as you mean to him?"

"No! Why would you -" He rubbed a hand across his mouth, collecting the summer night sweat that had been gathering there before he started walking in the direction of the Bunker again. "He's like a brother to me, I just..." He wanted to let himself think the words, wanted to shout them from the rooftops, but it would mean allowing himself to have something someone could take away from him. "I couldn't hug Cas, that's all."

"Yeah," her voice was small, but knowing. She was thinking over his words and processing them to memory. "That's all."

They were silent for the rest of the twenty minutes they were walking, the sigh that escaped when the hulking building was close enough was almost the same as the one he let out after pressing the girl with cherry lips and dark hair into the motel mattress not long before Amara had gotten in his head. He picked up his pace, sliding the front door open to let his mother in before stepping in in himself. She followed through the next door, steps raining down mutely behind his boots. 

Dean was about to make a snarky comment about home when Cas stumbled from the hallway looking particularly beaten. His eyes were out of focus and he had to blink several times to really look him in the eye. His mother seemed a bit excited to meet him, bouncing on the heels of her feet quietly as Cas looked between the two of them. "Den." He sounded like he'd been drinking, letters slurring impossibly while he made the effort to pronounce their names correctly. "Merie."

Dean watched Cas slump forward, knees buckling slightly before his eyes slipped closed. The two Winchesters caught the angel quickly, hands locked underneath his pits to keep his knees from cracking on the concrete floor. Though, Dean wasn't sure the angel would be the one hurting after that. Mary gave him a concerned look, tossing an arm over her shoulders quietly.

"I'm supposed to be dead," Dean shrugged and mimicked her movement, pulling them both in the direction of the bedrooms. They were opening Cas's door when an all too familiar voice carried down the hall.

"Dean," Charlie stood covered in dirt and ash, her eyes the only thing with a white spot to show. "Why is there someone in the torture chamber?"


End file.
